


Where I Cannot Follow

by calmanditsdr



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Combined Show and Books Canon, Flashbacks, Immortal Magnus Bane, M/M, Magnus Bane Needs A Hug, Memories, Mortal Alec Lightwood, Post-Canon, Sad, Tessa Gray - mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-08
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:07:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27455467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calmanditsdr/pseuds/calmanditsdr
Summary: When Alec dies, he leaves behind an immortal Magnus to wrestle with his memories and figure out how to go on.
Relationships: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 6
Kudos: 71





	Where I Cannot Follow

**Author's Note:**

> I have no excuse for this other than I was crying a few nights ago and wanted to make my comfort characters sad too. In retrospect, I could have been nicer.
> 
> Some of the flashbacks are scenes from the show, lines from the books, or paraphrased/similar scenes from the books. There are asterisks after each line that is directly from the books.

The neon lights that testified to the wakefulness of New York City even at midnight sliced through the drawn blinds and painted vibrant blue and magenta stripes across the floor of Magnus and Alec Lightwood-Bane’s loft. Neither of them were home, but their son Max was splayed across the couch with his face buried in the cushions in desperate search of sleep. He had found few precious hours of shut eye the past two weeks. 

_“You need to come to New York,” his brother said over the phone at 7 a.m. last Friday. “As soon as you can. Dad’s not doing well.”_

Knowing the attempt to rest was futile, Max sat up and dropped his head in his hands. He felt his parents’ cat Chairman Meow III shoving her face into his leg demandingly. He looked between his fingers and made eye contact with the animal. Her round blue eyes bore into his soul, so he picked her up. She rolled over in his arms and went limp, purring as he stroked her head. 

_“She just loathes the attention!” Magnus exclaimed. “Decades of tradition simply out the door!”_

_Max sat at the kitchen island, his plastic fork loaded with a bite of birthday cake. He, Rafe, and their fathers were all watching the new addition to the family as she lay on her back, paws stuck up in the air, protesting the extravagant party hat strapped onto her head._

Both Max and the cat jumped at the sudden sound of keys scraping at the front door. It opened, and Max’s brother Rafael ducked into the loft. His graying hair was flattened on one side from where he had been sleeping in a chair leaning against the wall at the Institute. After his first night in the Institute, Max refused to spend another, so he made up a lame excuse that as a Downworlder he felt uncomfortable sleeping in a Nephilim sanctuary. The truth, however, was that he couldn’t bear to hear his parents’ recollections of parties and Paris, of battles and beaches, of Venice and victories. That the whispered prayers of his father to the God he never called on were like a knife in his chest. 

“You awake?” Rafe asked into the dark room. 

“Yeah,” Max replied. He heard his brother approach, but kept his attention on the furry animal in his arms. 

_“Oh my god, what am I wearing?” Max demanded, pointing to the open photo album. It was a picture of him as a toddler clad in a ridiculous sailor suit and an excessive amount of even more ridiculous ribbons. His hair was quite a mess too._

_Alec leaned over from where he was sitting across from Max to look at the picture. He smiled as he remembered. “You used to, ah--” he chuckled and exchanged a look with Magnus who sat beside him, as if trying to decide the best way to recount doubtless embarrassing details. “You used to get in the litter box when you were little,” he said. “And whenever you did, Papa would put you in the Sailor Suit of Shame as punishment.”_

_Max blanched. Magnus beamed._

_Despite the horrifying backstories of all the pictures he was flipping through, Max couldn’t have asked for a better Christmas present._

Rafe sighed and sat down on the couch beside Max. The Chairman escaped Max’s arms and climbed into Rafe’s instead. 

“Excuse me, ma’am,” Max protested, his voice low in the way it had been the past few days and loaded with that attempt at humor everyone takes in those most serious moments that they would rather ignore. Rafe smiled the smile that everyone else smiles at those attempts because they are simply taking comfort in the fact that someone is trying to comfort them. 

The brothers sat in silence. Any stranger who would have seen them might have mistaken them for grandfather and grandson. No mundane would have even guessed that Rafael had lived only three more years than Max had.

Rafe broke the silence. “Brother Enoch said it’s any time now.” 

Max closed his eyes. Tears warmed the backs of his eyelids. “Should we go?” he asked. 

“Mhm,” Rafe mumbled. “Aunt Izzy’s with Papa now that I left.” 

Max's legs didn’t obey his mind’s command to get up. _If we don’t move_ , they protested, _it won’t happen_ . _If we stay here_ , they declared, _it will all be okay_. 

Max forced himself up anyway and made his way to the door, heedless of the fact that he was in a pair of fluffy pajama pants and a t-shirt bearing the logo of his uncle’s old band The Mortal Instruments. He scooped up his phone and keys from the table beside the door, but his hand froze on the nob. 

“How much is this going to hurt?” he blurted. 

Rafe, behind him now, laid a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “But we’ll find out together, like we always do.” 

_All the air escaped Max’s lungs as he crashed down on the mat. The end of his brother’s training staff was suddenly at his neck._

_“Three and oh,” Rafe declared. “And Papa taught me that move.”_

_Max rolled his eyes and outstretched his hand. A burst of magic shot out from his fingers and wrapped around Rafe’s ankles, sending the Shadowhunter toppling over. His staff flew out of his hand and into the wide mirror along the wall. The glass shattered._

_The brothers exchanged horrified looks. This was not the first nor second nor even third time they had managed to break something when trusted to train alone. Sure, the mirror could be mended with a flick of Magnus’s wrist, but_ it’s the principle of the matter _, Alec would say._

_“How mad are they going to be?” Rafe asked._

_“Let’s find out together.”_

It was selfish of him to be glad that Jace wasn’t there, Magnus thought. As Alec slept, Magnus lay awake beside him, his head on his chest, his silent tears dampening his covers. He glanced around the room with bleary, watery eyes. He could have sworn just yesterday he was magically extracting demon venom from Alec’s veins in this room. 

“Hey,” the weak greeting made Magnus sit up and furiously wipe at his eyes.

Magnus returned the smile Alec was giving him. “Hey, gorgeous,” he replied. 

Alec rolled his eyes. “Don’t,” he complained. 

Magnus chuckled and took his husband’s hand. 

Alec looked around the room. “Where are the boys?” he asked. 

Magnus dragged his immortally young fingers across Alec’s old and wrinkled ones. He traced the eye shaped rune on the back of his hand. “Max went to the loft earlier. Rafe’s gone to get him.” 

Alec nodded as he watched Magnus trace the dark swirls on his hand again and again and again. 

_“Do you know how beautiful you are?” Magnus asked, trailing his fingers down Alec’s torso. “I saw all seven wonders of the world before anyone declared them wonderful, but none of them compares to you,” he mused._

_Alec flushed at the praise. Magnus had been his first kiss a few weeks ago, and still every touch he planted upon him felt like a spark that would set his whole body aflame._

_“Don’t,” he objected, dragging his fingers down Magnus’s back that, for some reason to which Alec was very much opposed, was still hidden beneath a shirt. “Have you seen yourself?”_

_Magnus furrowed his brow and caught Alec’s gaze. “I’d rather look at you than anything else,” he declared. Then his eyes dropped from Alec’s and took a deliberately slow trail to his lips, to his shoulders, down his arms, across his chest, and down to the top of the V of his hips that was just barely exposed over the top of his jeans. There his eyes lingered._

_The admiration sent a chill down Alec’s spine. He pulled Magnus toward him. They were nose to nose now, legs a tangled knot beneath them._

_“Don’t you think it’s a bit rude,” Alec began, breathless, “That you still have a shirt on?”_

_Magnus chuckled, the sound deep in his chest. “If you’re so offended by it, why didn’t you say something sooner?” He reached down to relieve himself of the offending garment._

_Alec’s hand shot out to stop him. “Can I do it?” he asked._

_This Shadowhunter would be the death of him. “Yes,” Magnus answered. “Please do.”_

_After Alec tossed the shirt to the side, Magnus put a finger to his chest and pushed him backward. Alec fell gracefully onto the couch, and Magnus moved to straddle his hips. The expanse of pale, runed skin spread out beneath him sent a rush of blood downward. He wondered if Alec could feel how much he affected him. He almost rolled his hips down, but refrained, unsure of how Alec would have reacted._

_Instead, with a gentle hand, Magnus began to slowly trace the runes that decorated Alec’s body._

_A small one on his hip. “What’s this one for?” Magnus asked._

_Alec bit his lip at the sensation. “Equilibrium,” he answered._

_A curved one on his side. “What about this one?”_

_Alec sighed. “Flexibility.”_

_Magnus liked the sound of that. “Useful,” he murmured._

_An angled one below his collar bone. Magnus didn’t ask what this one was, but kept drawing his finger across it until Alec gasped, “Stamina.”_

_Magnus’s jaw dropped. “You’re just saying that to be sexy,” he declared._

_Alec licked his dry lips. “I’m not,” he replied. “I’m glad you like it though.”_

_“I—” Magnus began to speak, but decided to lean down and kiss Alec instead._

_Alec gasped into the kiss, and Magnus used the opening to slip his tongue into Alec’s mouth. Alec’s hands flew up to grip Magnus’s shoulders. His knees came up to bracket his hips. He tentatively pressed his own tongue against Magnus’s, unsure of what he was supposed to do. His shy initiative turned Magnus on even more._

_Magnus pulled away from the kiss and moved his lips to Alec’s neck. He planted light kisses all around, looking for sensitive areas. When he traced his tongue along the beautiful rune on his neck, Alec arched up and moaned._

_“Oh,” he breathed. “Magnus, do that again.”_

_Magnus would do anything to feel Alec press up into him like that again, so he did just as Alec asked. His licks were rewarded with another moan, and when he blew a puff of air onto the tongue-dampened rune, Alec wrapped his legs around Magnus’s waist and pulled him down against himself._

_“Someone’s sensitive,” Magnus teased, struggling to keep his hips still._

_“Never done this before,” Alec explained._

_Magnus caught his breath. They had made out before, plenty of times. Did Alec want..?_

_“Do you—” Magnus began, unsure of how to ask. “Do you want to go further?”_

_Alec nodded. “Yes,” he gasped. “Please.”_

_Magnus buried his face in Alec’s neck and groaned. Who knew a simple_ please _could be so hot?_

_Magnus pulled back to see Alec’s face. His cheeks were bright pink, his mouth was open, his pupils were blown. He already looked wrecked, and they hadn’t even done anything._

_Unable to resist it any longer, Magnus finally rolled his hips down against Alec’s. Alec sucked in a breath at the friction. His hands traveled up to twist and grab Magnus’s hair._

_There were far too many clothes between them._

_“Do you want to take our pants off?” Magnus suggested._

_Alec nodded at first, but then paused, a thoughtful expression crossing his features. “I don’t want to move,” he complained._

_Magnus laughed. “Say no more.” And with a quick wave of his hand, their jeans magically disappeared, leaving between them only the barrier of their underwear._

_Alec’s eyebrows pulled together at the new feeling. He wiggled his hips around a bit before grinding up against Magnus. When their bodies pressed together Alec whimpered._

_“Oh, does that feel good?” Magnus asked._

_Alec dropped his head back and nodded. “Yes,” he whined._

_So they repeated similar movements again and again until Alec was panting._

_“Magnus, can we--” he took deep breaths between each word. “More?” He slid his thumbs into the waistband of Magnus’s underwear and gave a gentle tug._

_Magnus pulled away to look at Alec, his dark locks sticking to his temples where sweat was beading, his blue eyes stormy with desire. “Of course,” Magnus smirked, and he felt some of the tension leave the man beneath him. “But first…” He reached up and traced the rune on Alec’s neck--the one that he had kissed and licked to Alec’s near ruin. “What’s this one?”_

“Magnus, I--” Alec began, turning his hand to hold his husband’s. Alec’s wedding band clinked against the Lightwood family ring Magnus was wearing. “I wish you wouldn’t cry,” he declared. 

Magnus looked from their joined hands to Alec’s face. “Who says I’ve been crying?” he demanded. 

Alec shot him an incredulous look, his blue eyes filled with nothing but love. “You’re crying now, dear,” he explained, and with the hand that wasn’t being held, he reached over and pressed his palm to Magnus’s cheek. He wiped a tear with his thumb. 

Magnus leaned into Alec’s touch. He let Alec wipe away as many tears that fell. 

“Max and Rafe,” Alec said almost absently, his eyes taking in each line and angle of Magnus’s face. “They’re going to be enough for you?” 

Magnus sat up straight. Alec’s hand fell from his face. “What?” he asked. 

Alec sighed. “The boys,” he clarified, “They’re gonna be with you. They’re gonna make it okay, right?” 

Magnus’s jaw dropped. He desperately reached for Alec’s hand and returned it to his face. “Nothing is going to make this okay,” he said. He found himself thinking of Tessa. She always said that time could never make you not miss someone; that the only thing time did was eventually make the pain of missing bearable.

Alec dropped his head. “There’s nothing I can do,” he mumbled. “Magnus, I’d fix this if I could, I’d--”

“Alexander, stop,” Magnus interrupted. “I know you live to love and protect those you love. You’ve never not done that,” he encouraged him. “And you will never not do that.” 

Alec’s eyes softened. “I just want you to be okay,” he said. 

Magnus shook his head, then leaned down to bury his face in Alec’s chest. Alec brought his hand up to Magnus’s head and gently rubbed his hair. He began speaking softly, and Magnus closed his eyes to savor every word. 

“You are my heart,” Alec mused, like he had so often. “And as long as you live and remember me, my heart will live too.” 

Magnus whispered a quick memory spell over himself so that he could recall all these words later. 

“The best thing that ever happened to me was you, and my life was amazing, and I promise that there is no way it would have been even somewhat good if you weren’t a part of it.

“You are everything that shines in this world. You are everything valuable. You are my diamond and ruby and gold and pearl and _adamas_. And I did everything I could to make the world know that, so don’t you ever let them forget it.” 

Magnus swallowed carefully before speaking. “Alexander,” he said, muffled by Alec’s chest. “ _Aku cinta kamu_.”

Alec planted a kiss on his husband’s hair. “I love you, Magnus.” 

_Their vows had those words from that Song of Songs. They danced on that beach near the Los Angeles Institute. One of their sons ate far too much cake, and the other got far too much cake on his face. Four-hundred years had not prepared him for a surprise wedding to the love of his centuries long life._

_When the festivities ended, they portaled back home._

_Wiping glittery eyeliner off of a wriggling toddler and wrestling a sugar-loaded six-year-old into bed proved to be a great amount of work. Once it was done, Magnus met his husband--he loved that word--in their room._

_Alec sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the new rune on his arm._

_“When do we draw the other one?” Magnus asked._

_Alec stood up and grabbed Magnus’s hands. He slipped his stele between Magnus’s fingers and wrapped his own around them. “Now,” he answered._

_Magnus watched mesmerized as the dark lines appeared on Alec’s skin. When it was complete, Alec slipped his stele into his pocket, and Magnus brushed his fingers over the place on Alec’s chest where the wedded union rune now stood out against his pale skin._

_He looked up, and they made eye contact. Magnus would never tire of those perfect blue eyes, of that perfect face, of that perfect smile._

_Solomon had been right, Magnus admitted. He had found the one his soul loved. And he would never let him go._

Magnus felt himself falling when Alec’s hand slowed in his hair. His senses vanished when he stopped hearing the steady thrum of Alec’s heartbeat in his chest. The world ceased to turn when Alec breathed his last. Magnus couldn’t help but feel like he had let him go. 

The sharp spires of the Institute cut through the growing periwinkle of the dawn sky. As Max and Rafe drew closer, they saw a familiar figure sitting on the front steps. 

It was Magnus. 

When Max recognized his father, he broke out in a run. He collapsed on the stairs beside him and pulled him into a hug he neither resisted nor returned. 

" _Bapak_ ," Max whispered the name he rarely used anymore. He took a breath before gently asking, “Is Dad..?”

Magnus doubled over, his head dropping between his knees. Max looked up at his brother who was beside them on the stairs now. Rafe pointed toward the door to indicate that he was going to go inside. Max found himself not wanting to follow him. 

The heavy doors of the Institute opened and closed, leaving Max and his father in the tranquil silence of the morning. Some birds began to sing. Breezes began to blow. Why hadn’t the earth realized it no longer spun? 

“Papa?” Max tried again, and suddenly, Magnus jumped up. He straightened his clothes aggressively and caught his son’s eyes in a steady gaze. 

“I’m going home,” he announced. “Come by when you’re done,” he gestured toward the Institute. “You’re welcome to stay with me for however long you want. Tell Rafael the same.” 

Before Max could reply, Magnus snapped his fingers to create a portal and stepped through it. 

He should have visualized the interior of his apartment instead of the building itself because his portal dumped him on the stoop outside instead of in the living room like he was used to. Maybe portal-traveling wasn’t best done in an emotional state. 

Nonetheless, Magnus trotted up the stairs to his loft. He stepped through the front door that was unlocked to him as always. 

_Sharp knocks rang through his apartment. Magnus hadn’t been expecting anyone, but he got up to answer it._

_Alec stepped through the open door and took off his coat. He glanced around the apartment with nervous eyes. “Is Jace here?” he asked._

_Magnus furrowed his eyebrows. “No, he left hours ago,” he responded. “Are you okay?”_

_Alec answered by grabbing Magnus’s face and kissing him._

Magnus slammed the door behind himself. The lights were off, but the growing brightness of the day made it easy enough to see. Chairman Meow III leaped off her perch on the table and bounded toward him. He hadn’t seen her in over a week (Max had been taking care of her), and she appeared to have missed him. 

Magnus bent over to pet his cat, but ended up sliding all the way down to the floor. The cat crawled into his lap and shoved her head under his hand. He dropped his face into her fur. 

The cat didn’t purr like she usually did at any form of affection. She rolled out from underneath Magnus and started pawing at his head. 

He looked up. “What?” he demanded. 

The cat stared at him with wide eyes that might have been filled with concern if she wasn’t a cat. 

“What?” Magnus asked again. The sharpness of his voice made his cat flinch. She meowed sadly and paced around him, trying to nudge back under Magnus’s hands. Maybe she sensed something was wrong. Maybe she was trying to comfort him. Or maybe she was just a cat trying to get attention. 

“Will you fuck off?” Magnus shouted, and the cat shrinked away. “Seriously! Just go!” 

She darted away and slid herself beneath the couch. 

Magnus rolled over and lay on the floor. It was cold, but he couldn’t feel it. 

_“Ow!” Alec exclaimed as Max’s tiny blue toddler fist fell in his face. “Plane crash.”_

_He had been laying on the floor with his legs in the air, balancing Max on his feet. Max had his arms out to the side and was making spectacular plane noises. When Max had started to topple, Alec pulled him down gently to prevent him from falling._

_“Again!” Max demanded._

_Alec smiled. “Pilot Max, all ready for takeoff?”_

Magnus felt a sharp sting behind his ear. A reminder that he needed to complete the memory spell he had cast earlier. He peeled himself off the ground and stumbled to his desk where he pulled out the materials he needed--an enchanted pen and a regular piece of paper. 

He whispered the words of the spell, and the pen began to write down all the words Alec had said to him just a few minutes--or was it hours--ago. It fell down when the spell was complete. 

Magnus picked up the paper and looked at it without reading the words that were there. He pressed the paper to his chest then walked into the living room and sat down heavily on the couch. He’d apologize to his cat later. 

_“Magnus,” Alec gasped, “On every mission I’ve ever been on, I’ve never felt that type of fear.” He took a breath. “Ever,” and continued. “Not knowing if you were alive or dead. I was terrified.”_

_Magnus reached out and touched his arm. “So was I.”_

_“Magnus,” Alec said, still breathing heavily. “I love you.”_

Magnus pulled his legs underneath himself. The thought of shoes on furniture was appalling, and the thick soles of his boots dug into his legs, but he didn’t care. 

_There seemed to be only one way out of Edom. Only one way to ensure that Alec could live and see the world again. Magnus had lived so many years anyway. He had no second thoughts of giving in to his father’s demands if it meant Alec would survive._

_“I don’t want the world,” Alec insisted. “I want you.”*_

Sun rays cascaded in through the blinds. Magnus shut his eyes against them. 

_“I want them to think ‘Alec Lightwood loved one man so much he changed the world for him’.”*_

With a snap, Magnus summoned heavy black-out curtains to block out the far too brilliant heat and light of the sun. 

_“Will you marry me, right now, tonight?”*_

Magnus carefully laid the paper on the coffee table. Then he wrapped his arms around his legs and buried his face in his knees. Alec had wished Magnus wouldn’t cry, so he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. 

Surely, he would forgive him. 

Sobs racked through his chest. Tears streamed down his face. His cries echoed through his lonely loft, but he was deaf to them. His lungs strained with each ragged inhale, but he was numb to the sting of it. 

He didn’t know how long it lasted or when he regained his senses, but some time later there was a gentle knocking on the front door. 

“Papa?” came the voice of Max. “Rafe is still at the Institute, it’s just me for now.” 

Magnus took a deep breath, straightened his posture, and wiped away his tears. He snapped and magicked open the door. He couldn’t help but notice that the sparks that left his hands were the precise blue of Alec’s eyes. 

  
  



End file.
